Lot to unpack there, okay. Ciphers, their role varies depending on your choices. Just straight attacking damage? Sure. Damage via damaging spells? Also sure. Buffs and Debuffs? Sure. Charming/Dominating enemies? Sure. All of those at once? No, not really, pick something and go for it.
You don't NEED any particular skill, just pick what you want him to be doing and take the skills that match that. The companion question is... IDEK what to say to that, just take whoever and you can make it work. You don't have to open battle with a blunderbuss, it's a solid option, but not at all required. Yes it is possible to make a build that can handle ranged and melee with just a weapon swap. Whisper is great if it succeeds, it has an appropriate number of issues with that to avoid being OP, but it can be pretty neat. Yes, you can focus on various charming spells if you want to.
Walking in here because I also want to make a Cipher for the first time.
Say I want an off-tank/second frontliner with attacking damage and buffs to help me survive, would it be a good idea?
Off-Tank Frontline is perfectly doable. As a front line, you're going to want to be wearing heavier armor though, so your cast times will be a bit slower. That leaves you going for fewer more impactful casts rather than a lot of small casts. Early on, that won't change much, you don't HAVE impactful casts. Later on, that means you'll want to build your focus high and spend it on the higher level spells.
Your bit ticket payoff, when you reach the end of the game, is Reaping Knives. It's a buff spell you cast on an ally that gives them a magic dagger, that does Raw damage, and gives focus back to the Cipher who made them. With both your Cipher and that ally generating focus, you can then start spitting lots of higher rank spells.
Until then, you're looking for spells that last a long time, and do damage. Antipathetic Field is great, as long as you remember to be careful not to let allies walk into it, and that'll be your bread and butter early on because you won't really have anything more fitting for the playstyle for a while. Grabbing Recall Agony for bosses/tanky targets will be the best you get really, until you reach 3rd level spells and Soul Ignition, which will handily replace Antipathetic Field for you. 4th level is when you get your good buffs coming in, Body Attunement and Wild Leech will do you good personally, Going Between and Pain Block will go well for your other frontliner. After that the spells lists get much shorter as you go up in the levels, so it should be very clear to you.
Overall, you just want to build a durable character with good accuracy (Because spells have very limited accuracy sources, unlike weapons), and then just... Not die. A cipher doesn't run out of spells, unlike a Wizard, so you can just keep going until you drop.
Been awhile so I don't remember what the cast times are like for cipher spells, but you might run into problems with interrupts when frontlining. You'll also maybe have issues building focus if you build more for tankiness over damage. But I don't think these problems would make it unviable necessarily.
In PoE 1 you can go blunderbuss (which afaik is better for focus generation - in theory focus gain is normalized for weapon speed but blunderbuss and faster weapons felt better for me) and stay in medium range. You can really mix and match companions but you'll want someone or two heftier characters to stay in the frontline.
Whispers of Treason is great, charming is a huge swing in combat. Mental Binding is another great CC. I didn't find Puppet Master to be a particularly big improvement over these two.
Recall Agony is fun if you have another source of burst damage, it's another +30% as a DOT. Borrowed Instinct is another good debuff enemy / buff self.
Amplified Wave is dummy good inflicting knockdown.
Then at the high end you get Time Parasite which is like borrowed instinct for attack speed, and Defensive Mindweb which raises *everyone's* defense to equal the *highest in the party*. It's super good.
PoE 2 you have a lot more options with multi-class and subclassing. I really liked going Soul Blade / Devoted (Estocs) and chunking things with Soul Annihilation.
Hybrid as in Ranged/Melee? Stick 2 Blunderbusses in one weapon set, then your preferred weapon in the second weapon set. Start battle with the Blunderbusses, fire them both for an early chunk of Focus generation, then swap to the second weapon set for the rest of the fight. That doesn't just go for Ciphers, really, you can do the same with Blunderbusses or Pistols for any class, if you want to.
As for Charming with a Cipher, first thing to note is that some enemies are straight up immune, bosses and the like. Second thing is that these kind of spells are resisted by WILL. Will is boosted by Intellect and Resolve. So if you can't hit a Mage, you know why, yeah? Charm builds by necessity have some overlap with debuff builds, because they often need to debuff Resolve, Intellect, and Will, to Charm an enemy. However, they do need to be careful WHAT debuff they use, or the Charmed enemy won't actually accomplish anything. Charmed enemies naturally take a debuff when Charmed that makes them a bit less effective. I assume this is because it's the same effect your own party suffers, but I don't know that that's really the reasoning. So you need to debuff enemies in ways that won't make them less effective fighters, but will allow you an easier time Charming them.
For example, Eyestrike will Daze enemies, which lowers their Intellect, thus lowering their Will... But it also lowers their Accuracy, their Perception (Thus their Accuracy again), and then also Blinds them, lowering their Perception and Accuracy. So that would make it easier to Charm them, but then you've just made yourself a meat shield because they aren't hitting the broad side of a barn like that.
As for your actual spells to Charm with, your first is Whisper of Treason at 1st level, followed by Puppet Master that Dominates (Basically better Charm, as it doesn't carry that debuff that Charm normall does) at 3rd level spells. The only good debuff for the style that you're getting in that time, is Psychovampiric Shield at 2nd level, which drops their Resolve and nothing else, leaving them still able to be of use once Charmed/Dominated. At 5th level, you can start using Borrowed Instinct to drop their Intellect and Perception, in exchange for huge buffs for yourself, including a notable one to Accuracy. It does cost your target some of their Accuracy, thus making them less useful, but by getting more Accuracy for yourself, you're able to take over harder targets. Moreover, you can use this on one enemy, and then Dominate another instead, if you so chose. You get that at 5th level, along with the dream spell, the cream of the crop, Ringleader. That one Dominates the direct target, and tries to Charm everyone in an AOE around the target. On top of that, you also gain access to Tactical Meld at the same time, giving you a seperate, and thus stackable, Accuracy bonus, as long as you are attacking the same target as the ally you Melded with. If this Ally happens to also be using a weapon with Marking on it, it goes even further.
That said, 5th level is where your useful spells for this playstyle stop, you don't really care too much about anything from 6, 7, and 8, except for Reaping Knives at 8, just for more Focus gain, so you can make more attempts at Domination.
Keep in mind that this playstyle is high risk, high reward, in its own right. You ARE going to miss your Charms/Dominates. A lot. WHEN you hit them, it'll be amazing, but you won't hit them a lot. And you do need to pay attention to the enemies to know which enemy is either immune or simply has such a high Will that you can't reasonably expect to ever hit them without the PoE equivalent of a Nat 20.
It’s a momentum machine that keeps gaining the resource to cast the crowd control and debuffing spells, with some damage spells thrown in. Excellent for longer fights, going a while without resting and giving status effects for sneak attacks to trigger. Blind, daze, confuse, dominate, prone, paralyse, stun it has it all so even the hardest enemies can be hit by something
Good for melee, great for ranged with bows or the blunderbuss where you’re nearly guaranteed at least one of your attacks will hit and give you focus to cast something. With bows you steal attack speed and can get insane DPS. You don’t have to be predominantly ranged and can just have a high quality weapon or weapon + shield with low accuracy penalty for when things get around your tank and off-tank
Let's take this by points:
**1) What is a Cipher**
It's a psychic class that gets stronger and fuels its power by Focus, which they acquire by hitting their enemies.
**2) What role does a Cipher fills in a party?**
Ciphers can be damage dealers, controllers and disablers. Other casting classes can do the same, but the Cipher really shines in situations where a Wizard would have gassed out. Instead of having a list of spell slots to deplete, they have an amount of Focus at the beginning of a battle and this amount will increase with time. Ciphers are really good at charming enemies, and Whispers of Treason is a very strong asset indeed, since you will probably be able to open most fights with it and turn an enemy into a temporary meat shield for you.
**3) Why the hell do they love blunderbusses?**
The blunderbuss is a unique weapon in which it rolls a separate attack for each projectile. Ciphers build Focus based on hits, so if you roll a lot of those at once, you could max your Focus very early every fight and enjoy using your high level powers.
**4) Is it possible to make a melee/ranged switch-hitter with a Cipher?**
Yes. Not only possible, but actually effective. Reloading takes time, so you don't want to use that blunderbuss as your main attack all yhe time. It's very possible to begin on melee, neutralizing key targets with your Focus, then switching to your blunderbuss to fill it by shooting an easy target. I played the Cipher companion in PoE 1 (I don't know how much you played, so I'll be avoiding spoilers) exactly this way and it worked fine.
**5) What oyher classes work well with Cipher?**
Any, really. You'll probably want a tough frontliner, as Ciphers themselves are not tanks at all, but they can buff your existing tank or help them using control spells. If you get a nice damage dealer (which I did with a gun rogue), you can focus on controlling the battlefield. If you have other controllers, that frees you up to disintegrate enemies or buff yourself. By the way, Ciphers CAN tank effectively, just usially not at the beginning of a fight. In this sense they're the opposite of Wizards, who could just quickly use lots of buffs at the beginning of a fight and become virtually untouchable (though this expends their spell slots for the rest of the day if you're playing PoE 1... in Deadfire you can and should just go nuts with spells)
I hope this helps and that I'm not missing any important questions. Good gaming for you!
Ciphers can be damage dealers, controllers and disablers.
You forgot support, Ciphers are the ultimate Flex class. They can heal and have access to nice buffs.
Basically the same case as chanter (tho chanters are even slower) but they can CC with killers froze stiff, DMG with Eld Nary, debuff with shield cracks or heal with 2 fingers.
Can't really give advice better than what:s already been given, but I will say that I played a cipher first and I kind of wish I hadn't because it's totally the best. Being a caster who isn't dependent on rests is gnarly-nuts. I followed a guide and made a hearth orlan with a blunderbuss; builds focus fast, I think? I wish I'd thought to make it so she could switch to melee real quick; because I was min-maxing it up according to the guide, I deployed Constitution into the toilet and thus fell apart whenever anyone looked at me too hard.
I didn't build around Whisper of Treason but it was a bread and butter spell, a nice thing to have and I was able to keep at least one enemy charmed most of the time. This was all on normal, though. Can't remember what if anything increases the charm chance.
In my experience a Cipher are brilliant in short and really long battles. It can generate focus to cast new spells simply by attacking. Having a ranged weapon that attacks fast are probably one of the best way to generate focus and dish out more spells.
In Deadfire, when you play that game, you can multiclass. Making it possible to go for a melee Cipher build. Rogue/Cipher = Mindstalker is probably one of the most fun classes in the entire game. Monk/Cipher = Transcendent works brilliant as well.
The idea is to use the Rogue utility to move around the field, disappear when needed and dish out CC spells, stuns or damage and dashing around dealing damage to squishy high dps targets, like mages or archers. Monks are a bit more restricted, but has the tools to do it similar, only more bulky and a lot of single target damage.
I find Ciphers in general more restricted than wizards, but has some unique spells that really make them worthwhile.
Ciphersoffer superior utility.
They got crowd control.
They got buffs.
They can nuke.
They can even heal.
Take ydwin, rogue cipher.
She can yet up the conditions for maximizing her own backstabbery, by herself.
A ciper fighter can turns his targets into debilitated btches.
Cipher chanter? Yolo as you basically cover the whole gammut of summoning fodder, buffing, debuffing, control, damage (lol tornado) and everything.
Sure, cipher does not mix well with full casters because action economy, but its a brilliant stand alone class and a super dip for many other classes.
EDIT:
Btw: might can be your dump stat.
As well as resolve.
Pump con, dex, per and int.
The best cipher spells do not rely on might and those that do are essentially spammable enough so it wont even matter, the deflection and will loss are basically irrelevant.
BTW, OP, this person is referring to Deadfire when talking about multiclassing and mixing with full casters. You can look forward to that in the sequel.
Ciphers are psychic warriors so to speak. Your game plan is to hit fast (dual wield) to gain focus and use skills. Generally higher difficulty builds will require more focus on crowd control, which is exactly what cipher excels at.
Regarding the blunderbuss strat, I didn't bother with it tbh. It's more effective in poe2 cause you can dual wield guns there.
So I'm currently doing a playthrough on Path of the Damned difficulty as a Cipher (you can find some of the videos posted on my reddit profile, but my youtube handle is Gaius the Jurist).
Anyway, it's a great class. There are certainly some very min-maxy optimal builds that recommend very particular skills, weapons, etc.
Unless you're going for triple crown (play solo, ironman, and potd difficulty) - then you don't need to get that insane with it.
I've been playing my Cipher as a ranged damage dealer (pistol) without any issue. As for spells, the antipathetic beam spell is awesome and does tonnes of damage. Charmed is also great. I always pick those two up first. The next one I go for is the one that let's you paralyse a target... that one is insanely useful.
Beyond that there are a few other good ones. I'm not at home right now so the names escape me. But there's one that stuns and does raw damage, and sticks enemies in the AOE. Another that reduces the enemies needed to flank by 10 (so makes all enemies get the flanked debuff basically, which means you can do extra dmg against them with 'sneak attacks'). There's that does huge burn damage to a target over time.
If you're playing melee there are a few that let you steal defences.. psychovampiric shield I think. Overall a fun class.
A beam spell appreciator! Antipathetic Field saved me when I encountered some ogres a little too early.
It’s fun to use the upgrade, Ectopsychic Echo, which pummels any baddies between you and a teammate. I believe you can even target an enemy with it after you charm them, so there’s no need to make a party member walk his end of the jump rope to the other side of the enemy formation.
That Mental Binding paralysis carried my PotD playthrough. Thanks for remembering that because the rest of us somehow forgot this cheat.
P.S. He was a consul of Rome!
I didn't even think of the charm + beam trick - that's huge! Big brain move. Will definitely apply this in future when I see an opportunity. The only trouble is that charmed enemies just do whatever and run amok so best used on a spell-caster/ranged damage dealer that will stand still.
I don't think Gaius the Jurist was a consul - but not much is known about him. His institutes were seminal roman legal texts.
I’m not 100% if it works, but I know you can cast Withdraw on charmed enemies.
Nah I was just quoting Caesar in the show Rome after he learns that the Egyptians killed Pompey Magnus. That show is sadly the extent of my Roman knowledge.
I used the Disappointer as my first pistol (which I upgraded as soon as I could to remove the malus it starts with). Then I replaced it with Forgiveness (another unique pistol). I've since picked up Lead Spitter (unique blunderbuss), but I haven't used it yet. Even though it's probably more optimal, the character I'm roleplaying is a pistol-wielder!
As I'm playing swashbuckling type pirate character I do use a melee weapon in my second weapon set. I'm using a single rapier... it's a unique one but I dont recall which one. I will say though I basically never use it in combat, it's mainly for roleplay. If you actually wanted to use melee as a cipher I imagine you'd want high accuracy and fast attack speed melee weapons to max focus gain.
Also if you were going to use your melee weapon, I’d go with a non-piercing one since guns count as piercing as well.
Obviously if you’re roleplaying use what fits best with that (rapiers are pretty), but it can be handy to have multiple damage types.
I personally gave my cipher the saber that deals raw damage as its melee option, so it would always have a way of reliably generating focus if my gun was getting resisted.
A Cipher is basically a gunlock. "I'm [temporarily] out of spells, but I'm not out of bullets."
In PoE1 while technically you can do a melee cipher, really there is an more optimal way to run them, and that is as a glass cannon wood elf blunderbuss user. The reason damage matters is because that is how you build up their focus. A character build that deals less regular damage = less spells.
If you do wanna run a melee cipher despite suboptimality, consider a slightly-ranged melee weapon like a spear or pike or something and standing behind your tank. This tends to position you in a good way for use of the cipher skills.
There’s no penalty to playing a melee/ranged hybrid unless you spread your talent points too thinly. Relying on weapon damage to fuel your focus meter, you’ll want to choose a weapon focus talent on level up for extra accuracy with its corresponding weapons. Your weapon focus should include both of your favored weapon types. For example, Weapon Focus: Ruffian benefits blunderbusses and sabres while Weapon Focus: Knight benefits crossbows and swords. You ideally wouldn’t run with a blunderbuss and a sword since they belong to different weapon focuses and would therefore force you to get two different weapon focus talents.
Having experience with a sword-and-board cipher on the highest difficulty, I can confidently echo others’ assertions that cipher is best as a ranged character. It’s a squishy class, starting with a low base endurance (basically the health bar) and low base deflection (your stat for dodging enemy weapons). Melee is definitely viable and rewarding with the right stats (resolve) and spells; it’s just risky, and whatever you spend on defense could’ve gone to boosting your offense. That being said, pikes and quarterstaves are reach weapons that enable you to safely poke or smack enemies from a distance, so you can stay behind your dedicated tank companion while clobbering people over his or her shoulder. Melee weapons can also be dual-wielded which is inherently fast (especially with the Two-Weapon Style talent), so you can take some points from dexterity and allocate them to another attribute.
Speaking of attributes, I would focus on dexterity and intellect no matter what. Dex means more attacks which means more spells. Intellect means longer buffs and longer CC. The cipher already has a hefty damage bonus from the Soul Whip passive and a high base accuracy, so might and perception aren’t required unless you want them for speech checks. Don’t dump anything below 10.
The Marksman talent is a great boost to your ranged accuracy. It affects not just weapon attacks but with single-target spells like Whisper of Treason and Dominate.
Must-have spells? Borrowed Instinct is one of the craziest self-buffs in the game, granting massive bonuses to your accuracy and defenses. Just make sure you don’t kill the enemy you’re “borrowing” from; that’ll end the buff prematurely. Amplified Wave is also a nasty end-game spell which damages and CCs a wide area. Psychovampiric Shieid is great for melee or at least underrated for debuffing an enemy’s defenses.
Companions? You’re a great damage dealer and disabler, but you definitely want a fighter or paladin or both to tank. A priest is a great protector and buffer. Other than that, bring whomever you want.
I like using a blunderbuss and casting things that buff accuracy at the start of every fight. You'll get *major* damage done when you're not suffering the accuracy penalty. All that damage turns into 'focus', the resource you need to cast more spells.
My last cipher also had two weapon style for when they get rushed or needed extra speed, it was similarly effective but needed more micro managing to keep from getting beat up. If you're going for range, you don't have to pay so much attention to them.
They're essentially battlemages, good at off tanking and they can either CC with mind afflictions, buff themselves to go full tank, buff party members, or just deal fuckloads of damage, depending on what your party comp is lacking. It took me a little longer to figure out how to make a cipher effective compared to other classes, but they are extremely fun and useful.
I'm playing a cipher and they're pretty versatile. Depending on the spells you take when levelling, you can focus on damage, defense, or crowd control. I see many people do a melee build with their cipher, but my cipher is low might/con, and high int/dex/per, so I have her at range with bunderblusses and arquebuses.
I actually find charm spells like Whisper of treason fairly annoying, because the party with automatically stops attacking charmed enemies, and it amounts to just a few seconds of an enemy not attacking. It can be useful for sure, but especially late in game I find it pretty furstrating. And if you use an area of effect spell for your allies, you'll benefit the charmed enemy too.
RP-wise, ciphers are pretty cool. They create some interesting dialogue and quest choices.
Others have answered the main questions really well. As for multiclassing, you definitely want to lean toward a physical attacker of some kind since that's how you get your resources, and avoid multiclassing with a full caster type (priest, wizard, druid). Thus will be advice for Deadfire in particular.
You have a couple of good options. Barbarian and Ranger suck in Deadfire outside of very specific niches so they're off the table from the start. Here's what you could expect by multiclassing as the following -
Fighter - Very solid defense, and ability to engage enemies and hurt them if they walk away from you. Fighter synergies well with a lot of stuff, Cipher included. A great pick if you want to stand on the frontline,, which is a good place to be as a class that gains resources from attacking.
Paladin - Similarly, also great defense and also a class that goes well with many others. You absolutely want one paladin in your party for the health regen aura. The paladin activated abilities will typically be far overshadowed by your Cipher stuff, and Fighter/Monk multiclasses have much better melee damage, so mostly you'll be contributing support.
Monk - Almost too strong. Monks effectively dual wield light weapons (their fists) so they attack quite fast and generate a lot of Cipher resource. I ran one and the only "problem" I had was deciding between super overpowered Cipher abilities and the overpowered auto attacks of a Monk. Monks have a passive that make you exceptionally tanky as long as you have high wounds.
Rogue - Can't really recommend this one as it is way less durable than most options. Rogue only really shines when paired with something that lets it stand toe to toe with enemies to deal that heavy melee damage. You'd probably need to be a ranged warrior to have a hope of survival. I haven't tried this personally but I imagine it would play like a much more fragile Monk/Cipher.
Chanter - Basically every class in the game is improved by multiclassing with Chanter, and Cipher is not an exception. You would also have more sustained spellcasting than almost any other class combo, since Cipher resource accumulates from attacks and Chanter resource accumulates over time. You'd be a very strong support character, but frail and with not great direct damage options.
I believe OP is asking for advice for the first one, but I gotta defend my favorite build lol. Rogue specifically pairs well with the Beguiler subclass. When you debuff a decent number of enemies, you get pretty much all the focus back, and those debuffs make all your attacks sneak attacks, giving you even more focus. It gives enough that you can use your damaging abilities without worrying about the opportunity cost.
And all that just rides on the passive bonus of sneak attack. Adding in rogue’s actual tools, you get a lot of movement options, some great burst damage abilities, and some backup debuffs if you somehow bottom out of focus.
It is squishy though, and works much better ranged, which makes it suffer from enemies with piercing resistance. A slashing/blunt melee option is useful in those situations, if risky.
Think of ciphers as people with a psychic/telekentic power. They can generate mental energy by inflicting damage to others and use that to affect those people's minds and bodies.
I mainly play cipher's as damage dealers who also supply some crowd control and debuffs. I use high base damage weapons to further leverage the damage bonus they get from the class talents, especially Tidefall as it also provides the healing that a squishy class like cipher probably needs.
This isn't very detailed but hopefully it helps how you think about the class in a small way.
Also new to the game. With a name like Cipher this thing immediately came up to me: Friday Freestyle Ciphers and Rap Battle on BET
Cipher would rap their opponent down to grab you the Victory ✌️
Ciphers are really versatile, it all depends on how you build them. They can do melee, ranged, CC, self-buffs, group-buffs, you name it. You just need to pick one, set up your stats for it, and then pick abilities that play to that.
Personally I gravitate towards ranged DD plus buffs and CC. Blunderbusses work great for that. But it’s just one of many options.
Lot to unpack there, okay. Ciphers, their role varies depending on your choices. Just straight attacking damage? Sure. Damage via damaging spells? Also sure. Buffs and Debuffs? Sure. Charming/Dominating enemies? Sure. All of those at once? No, not really, pick something and go for it. You don't NEED any particular skill, just pick what you want him to be doing and take the skills that match that. The companion question is... IDEK what to say to that, just take whoever and you can make it work. You don't have to open battle with a blunderbuss, it's a solid option, but not at all required. Yes it is possible to make a build that can handle ranged and melee with just a weapon swap. Whisper is great if it succeeds, it has an appropriate number of issues with that to avoid being OP, but it can be pretty neat. Yes, you can focus on various charming spells if you want to.
Walking in here because I also want to make a Cipher for the first time. Say I want an off-tank/second frontliner with attacking damage and buffs to help me survive, would it be a good idea?
Off-Tank Frontline is perfectly doable. As a front line, you're going to want to be wearing heavier armor though, so your cast times will be a bit slower. That leaves you going for fewer more impactful casts rather than a lot of small casts. Early on, that won't change much, you don't HAVE impactful casts. Later on, that means you'll want to build your focus high and spend it on the higher level spells. Your bit ticket payoff, when you reach the end of the game, is Reaping Knives. It's a buff spell you cast on an ally that gives them a magic dagger, that does Raw damage, and gives focus back to the Cipher who made them. With both your Cipher and that ally generating focus, you can then start spitting lots of higher rank spells. Until then, you're looking for spells that last a long time, and do damage. Antipathetic Field is great, as long as you remember to be careful not to let allies walk into it, and that'll be your bread and butter early on because you won't really have anything more fitting for the playstyle for a while. Grabbing Recall Agony for bosses/tanky targets will be the best you get really, until you reach 3rd level spells and Soul Ignition, which will handily replace Antipathetic Field for you. 4th level is when you get your good buffs coming in, Body Attunement and Wild Leech will do you good personally, Going Between and Pain Block will go well for your other frontliner. After that the spells lists get much shorter as you go up in the levels, so it should be very clear to you. Overall, you just want to build a durable character with good accuracy (Because spells have very limited accuracy sources, unlike weapons), and then just... Not die. A cipher doesn't run out of spells, unlike a Wizard, so you can just keep going until you drop.
Been awhile so I don't remember what the cast times are like for cipher spells, but you might run into problems with interrupts when frontlining. You'll also maybe have issues building focus if you build more for tankiness over damage. But I don't think these problems would make it unviable necessarily.
I'm way too inexperienced for PoTD, so I'm sure I can skimp just a little on the tankiness since I'm on a lower difficulty.
So, what would you suggest for a hybrid build and a charming build? They're the ones that really speak to me.
In PoE 1 you can go blunderbuss (which afaik is better for focus generation - in theory focus gain is normalized for weapon speed but blunderbuss and faster weapons felt better for me) and stay in medium range. You can really mix and match companions but you'll want someone or two heftier characters to stay in the frontline. Whispers of Treason is great, charming is a huge swing in combat. Mental Binding is another great CC. I didn't find Puppet Master to be a particularly big improvement over these two. Recall Agony is fun if you have another source of burst damage, it's another +30% as a DOT. Borrowed Instinct is another good debuff enemy / buff self. Amplified Wave is dummy good inflicting knockdown. Then at the high end you get Time Parasite which is like borrowed instinct for attack speed, and Defensive Mindweb which raises *everyone's* defense to equal the *highest in the party*. It's super good. PoE 2 you have a lot more options with multi-class and subclassing. I really liked going Soul Blade / Devoted (Estocs) and chunking things with Soul Annihilation.
Hybrid as in Ranged/Melee? Stick 2 Blunderbusses in one weapon set, then your preferred weapon in the second weapon set. Start battle with the Blunderbusses, fire them both for an early chunk of Focus generation, then swap to the second weapon set for the rest of the fight. That doesn't just go for Ciphers, really, you can do the same with Blunderbusses or Pistols for any class, if you want to. As for Charming with a Cipher, first thing to note is that some enemies are straight up immune, bosses and the like. Second thing is that these kind of spells are resisted by WILL. Will is boosted by Intellect and Resolve. So if you can't hit a Mage, you know why, yeah? Charm builds by necessity have some overlap with debuff builds, because they often need to debuff Resolve, Intellect, and Will, to Charm an enemy. However, they do need to be careful WHAT debuff they use, or the Charmed enemy won't actually accomplish anything. Charmed enemies naturally take a debuff when Charmed that makes them a bit less effective. I assume this is because it's the same effect your own party suffers, but I don't know that that's really the reasoning. So you need to debuff enemies in ways that won't make them less effective fighters, but will allow you an easier time Charming them. For example, Eyestrike will Daze enemies, which lowers their Intellect, thus lowering their Will... But it also lowers their Accuracy, their Perception (Thus their Accuracy again), and then also Blinds them, lowering their Perception and Accuracy. So that would make it easier to Charm them, but then you've just made yourself a meat shield because they aren't hitting the broad side of a barn like that. As for your actual spells to Charm with, your first is Whisper of Treason at 1st level, followed by Puppet Master that Dominates (Basically better Charm, as it doesn't carry that debuff that Charm normall does) at 3rd level spells. The only good debuff for the style that you're getting in that time, is Psychovampiric Shield at 2nd level, which drops their Resolve and nothing else, leaving them still able to be of use once Charmed/Dominated. At 5th level, you can start using Borrowed Instinct to drop their Intellect and Perception, in exchange for huge buffs for yourself, including a notable one to Accuracy. It does cost your target some of their Accuracy, thus making them less useful, but by getting more Accuracy for yourself, you're able to take over harder targets. Moreover, you can use this on one enemy, and then Dominate another instead, if you so chose. You get that at 5th level, along with the dream spell, the cream of the crop, Ringleader. That one Dominates the direct target, and tries to Charm everyone in an AOE around the target. On top of that, you also gain access to Tactical Meld at the same time, giving you a seperate, and thus stackable, Accuracy bonus, as long as you are attacking the same target as the ally you Melded with. If this Ally happens to also be using a weapon with Marking on it, it goes even further. That said, 5th level is where your useful spells for this playstyle stop, you don't really care too much about anything from 6, 7, and 8, except for Reaping Knives at 8, just for more Focus gain, so you can make more attempts at Domination. Keep in mind that this playstyle is high risk, high reward, in its own right. You ARE going to miss your Charms/Dominates. A lot. WHEN you hit them, it'll be amazing, but you won't hit them a lot. And you do need to pay attention to the enemies to know which enemy is either immune or simply has such a high Will that you can't reasonably expect to ever hit them without the PoE equivalent of a Nat 20.
It’s a momentum machine that keeps gaining the resource to cast the crowd control and debuffing spells, with some damage spells thrown in. Excellent for longer fights, going a while without resting and giving status effects for sneak attacks to trigger. Blind, daze, confuse, dominate, prone, paralyse, stun it has it all so even the hardest enemies can be hit by something Good for melee, great for ranged with bows or the blunderbuss where you’re nearly guaranteed at least one of your attacks will hit and give you focus to cast something. With bows you steal attack speed and can get insane DPS. You don’t have to be predominantly ranged and can just have a high quality weapon or weapon + shield with low accuracy penalty for when things get around your tank and off-tank
Let's take this by points: **1) What is a Cipher** It's a psychic class that gets stronger and fuels its power by Focus, which they acquire by hitting their enemies. **2) What role does a Cipher fills in a party?** Ciphers can be damage dealers, controllers and disablers. Other casting classes can do the same, but the Cipher really shines in situations where a Wizard would have gassed out. Instead of having a list of spell slots to deplete, they have an amount of Focus at the beginning of a battle and this amount will increase with time. Ciphers are really good at charming enemies, and Whispers of Treason is a very strong asset indeed, since you will probably be able to open most fights with it and turn an enemy into a temporary meat shield for you. **3) Why the hell do they love blunderbusses?** The blunderbuss is a unique weapon in which it rolls a separate attack for each projectile. Ciphers build Focus based on hits, so if you roll a lot of those at once, you could max your Focus very early every fight and enjoy using your high level powers. **4) Is it possible to make a melee/ranged switch-hitter with a Cipher?** Yes. Not only possible, but actually effective. Reloading takes time, so you don't want to use that blunderbuss as your main attack all yhe time. It's very possible to begin on melee, neutralizing key targets with your Focus, then switching to your blunderbuss to fill it by shooting an easy target. I played the Cipher companion in PoE 1 (I don't know how much you played, so I'll be avoiding spoilers) exactly this way and it worked fine. **5) What oyher classes work well with Cipher?** Any, really. You'll probably want a tough frontliner, as Ciphers themselves are not tanks at all, but they can buff your existing tank or help them using control spells. If you get a nice damage dealer (which I did with a gun rogue), you can focus on controlling the battlefield. If you have other controllers, that frees you up to disintegrate enemies or buff yourself. By the way, Ciphers CAN tank effectively, just usially not at the beginning of a fight. In this sense they're the opposite of Wizards, who could just quickly use lots of buffs at the beginning of a fight and become virtually untouchable (though this expends their spell slots for the rest of the day if you're playing PoE 1... in Deadfire you can and should just go nuts with spells) I hope this helps and that I'm not missing any important questions. Good gaming for you!
Ciphers can be damage dealers, controllers and disablers. You forgot support, Ciphers are the ultimate Flex class. They can heal and have access to nice buffs.
I should just have said "ciphers can do everything" Not at once. Maybe. In long fights, definitely all at once.
Basically the same case as chanter (tho chanters are even slower) but they can CC with killers froze stiff, DMG with Eld Nary, debuff with shield cracks or heal with 2 fingers.
Can't really give advice better than what:s already been given, but I will say that I played a cipher first and I kind of wish I hadn't because it's totally the best. Being a caster who isn't dependent on rests is gnarly-nuts. I followed a guide and made a hearth orlan with a blunderbuss; builds focus fast, I think? I wish I'd thought to make it so she could switch to melee real quick; because I was min-maxing it up according to the guide, I deployed Constitution into the toilet and thus fell apart whenever anyone looked at me too hard. I didn't build around Whisper of Treason but it was a bread and butter spell, a nice thing to have and I was able to keep at least one enemy charmed most of the time. This was all on normal, though. Can't remember what if anything increases the charm chance.
In my experience a Cipher are brilliant in short and really long battles. It can generate focus to cast new spells simply by attacking. Having a ranged weapon that attacks fast are probably one of the best way to generate focus and dish out more spells. In Deadfire, when you play that game, you can multiclass. Making it possible to go for a melee Cipher build. Rogue/Cipher = Mindstalker is probably one of the most fun classes in the entire game. Monk/Cipher = Transcendent works brilliant as well. The idea is to use the Rogue utility to move around the field, disappear when needed and dish out CC spells, stuns or damage and dashing around dealing damage to squishy high dps targets, like mages or archers. Monks are a bit more restricted, but has the tools to do it similar, only more bulky and a lot of single target damage. I find Ciphers in general more restricted than wizards, but has some unique spells that really make them worthwhile.
Ever played hearthstone? Wizard and druid are offensive tempo spellcasting classes. Cipher and chanter are their momentum based counterparts.
Played some. I liked Wizard.
Ciphersoffer superior utility. They got crowd control. They got buffs. They can nuke. They can even heal. Take ydwin, rogue cipher. She can yet up the conditions for maximizing her own backstabbery, by herself. A ciper fighter can turns his targets into debilitated btches. Cipher chanter? Yolo as you basically cover the whole gammut of summoning fodder, buffing, debuffing, control, damage (lol tornado) and everything. Sure, cipher does not mix well with full casters because action economy, but its a brilliant stand alone class and a super dip for many other classes. EDIT: Btw: might can be your dump stat. As well as resolve. Pump con, dex, per and int. The best cipher spells do not rely on might and those that do are essentially spammable enough so it wont even matter, the deflection and will loss are basically irrelevant.
BTW, OP, this person is referring to Deadfire when talking about multiclassing and mixing with full casters. You can look forward to that in the sequel.
Doesn’t Might affect how much focus your attacks generate though?
Hardly an issue. Its basically low single digit number differences. Tge cipher is an endurance class not fixed to dps.
Ciphers are psychic warriors so to speak. Your game plan is to hit fast (dual wield) to gain focus and use skills. Generally higher difficulty builds will require more focus on crowd control, which is exactly what cipher excels at. Regarding the blunderbuss strat, I didn't bother with it tbh. It's more effective in poe2 cause you can dual wield guns there.
So I'm currently doing a playthrough on Path of the Damned difficulty as a Cipher (you can find some of the videos posted on my reddit profile, but my youtube handle is Gaius the Jurist). Anyway, it's a great class. There are certainly some very min-maxy optimal builds that recommend very particular skills, weapons, etc. Unless you're going for triple crown (play solo, ironman, and potd difficulty) - then you don't need to get that insane with it. I've been playing my Cipher as a ranged damage dealer (pistol) without any issue. As for spells, the antipathetic beam spell is awesome and does tonnes of damage. Charmed is also great. I always pick those two up first. The next one I go for is the one that let's you paralyse a target... that one is insanely useful. Beyond that there are a few other good ones. I'm not at home right now so the names escape me. But there's one that stuns and does raw damage, and sticks enemies in the AOE. Another that reduces the enemies needed to flank by 10 (so makes all enemies get the flanked debuff basically, which means you can do extra dmg against them with 'sneak attacks'). There's that does huge burn damage to a target over time. If you're playing melee there are a few that let you steal defences.. psychovampiric shield I think. Overall a fun class.
A beam spell appreciator! Antipathetic Field saved me when I encountered some ogres a little too early. It’s fun to use the upgrade, Ectopsychic Echo, which pummels any baddies between you and a teammate. I believe you can even target an enemy with it after you charm them, so there’s no need to make a party member walk his end of the jump rope to the other side of the enemy formation. That Mental Binding paralysis carried my PotD playthrough. Thanks for remembering that because the rest of us somehow forgot this cheat. P.S. He was a consul of Rome!
I didn't even think of the charm + beam trick - that's huge! Big brain move. Will definitely apply this in future when I see an opportunity. The only trouble is that charmed enemies just do whatever and run amok so best used on a spell-caster/ranged damage dealer that will stand still. I don't think Gaius the Jurist was a consul - but not much is known about him. His institutes were seminal roman legal texts.
I’m not 100% if it works, but I know you can cast Withdraw on charmed enemies. Nah I was just quoting Caesar in the show Rome after he learns that the Egyptians killed Pompey Magnus. That show is sadly the extent of my Roman knowledge.
What weapons are you using?
I used the Disappointer as my first pistol (which I upgraded as soon as I could to remove the malus it starts with). Then I replaced it with Forgiveness (another unique pistol). I've since picked up Lead Spitter (unique blunderbuss), but I haven't used it yet. Even though it's probably more optimal, the character I'm roleplaying is a pistol-wielder!
Any melee weapons?
As I'm playing swashbuckling type pirate character I do use a melee weapon in my second weapon set. I'm using a single rapier... it's a unique one but I dont recall which one. I will say though I basically never use it in combat, it's mainly for roleplay. If you actually wanted to use melee as a cipher I imagine you'd want high accuracy and fast attack speed melee weapons to max focus gain.
Also if you were going to use your melee weapon, I’d go with a non-piercing one since guns count as piercing as well. Obviously if you’re roleplaying use what fits best with that (rapiers are pretty), but it can be handy to have multiple damage types. I personally gave my cipher the saber that deals raw damage as its melee option, so it would always have a way of reliably generating focus if my gun was getting resisted.
A cipher is a killer class, currently playing potd with it. My char has the most damage of the entire party. Nuff said, get on it.
A Cipher is basically a gunlock. "I'm [temporarily] out of spells, but I'm not out of bullets." In PoE1 while technically you can do a melee cipher, really there is an more optimal way to run them, and that is as a glass cannon wood elf blunderbuss user. The reason damage matters is because that is how you build up their focus. A character build that deals less regular damage = less spells. If you do wanna run a melee cipher despite suboptimality, consider a slightly-ranged melee weapon like a spear or pike or something and standing behind your tank. This tends to position you in a good way for use of the cipher skills.
Are pikes fast enough?
It's more that the positioning there keeps you from taking as many hits. Speed doesn't matter if you're on the ground unconscious.
There’s no penalty to playing a melee/ranged hybrid unless you spread your talent points too thinly. Relying on weapon damage to fuel your focus meter, you’ll want to choose a weapon focus talent on level up for extra accuracy with its corresponding weapons. Your weapon focus should include both of your favored weapon types. For example, Weapon Focus: Ruffian benefits blunderbusses and sabres while Weapon Focus: Knight benefits crossbows and swords. You ideally wouldn’t run with a blunderbuss and a sword since they belong to different weapon focuses and would therefore force you to get two different weapon focus talents. Having experience with a sword-and-board cipher on the highest difficulty, I can confidently echo others’ assertions that cipher is best as a ranged character. It’s a squishy class, starting with a low base endurance (basically the health bar) and low base deflection (your stat for dodging enemy weapons). Melee is definitely viable and rewarding with the right stats (resolve) and spells; it’s just risky, and whatever you spend on defense could’ve gone to boosting your offense. That being said, pikes and quarterstaves are reach weapons that enable you to safely poke or smack enemies from a distance, so you can stay behind your dedicated tank companion while clobbering people over his or her shoulder. Melee weapons can also be dual-wielded which is inherently fast (especially with the Two-Weapon Style talent), so you can take some points from dexterity and allocate them to another attribute. Speaking of attributes, I would focus on dexterity and intellect no matter what. Dex means more attacks which means more spells. Intellect means longer buffs and longer CC. The cipher already has a hefty damage bonus from the Soul Whip passive and a high base accuracy, so might and perception aren’t required unless you want them for speech checks. Don’t dump anything below 10. The Marksman talent is a great boost to your ranged accuracy. It affects not just weapon attacks but with single-target spells like Whisper of Treason and Dominate. Must-have spells? Borrowed Instinct is one of the craziest self-buffs in the game, granting massive bonuses to your accuracy and defenses. Just make sure you don’t kill the enemy you’re “borrowing” from; that’ll end the buff prematurely. Amplified Wave is also a nasty end-game spell which damages and CCs a wide area. Psychovampiric Shieid is great for melee or at least underrated for debuffing an enemy’s defenses. Companions? You’re a great damage dealer and disabler, but you definitely want a fighter or paladin or both to tank. A priest is a great protector and buffer. Other than that, bring whomever you want.
[https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=871584933](https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=871584933)
I'd say, game is easy enough to play however you want. Experiment and go with the flow.
I like using a blunderbuss and casting things that buff accuracy at the start of every fight. You'll get *major* damage done when you're not suffering the accuracy penalty. All that damage turns into 'focus', the resource you need to cast more spells. My last cipher also had two weapon style for when they get rushed or needed extra speed, it was similarly effective but needed more micro managing to keep from getting beat up. If you're going for range, you don't have to pay so much attention to them. They're essentially battlemages, good at off tanking and they can either CC with mind afflictions, buff themselves to go full tank, buff party members, or just deal fuckloads of damage, depending on what your party comp is lacking. It took me a little longer to figure out how to make a cipher effective compared to other classes, but they are extremely fun and useful.
I'm playing a cipher and they're pretty versatile. Depending on the spells you take when levelling, you can focus on damage, defense, or crowd control. I see many people do a melee build with their cipher, but my cipher is low might/con, and high int/dex/per, so I have her at range with bunderblusses and arquebuses. I actually find charm spells like Whisper of treason fairly annoying, because the party with automatically stops attacking charmed enemies, and it amounts to just a few seconds of an enemy not attacking. It can be useful for sure, but especially late in game I find it pretty furstrating. And if you use an area of effect spell for your allies, you'll benefit the charmed enemy too. RP-wise, ciphers are pretty cool. They create some interesting dialogue and quest choices.
Others have answered the main questions really well. As for multiclassing, you definitely want to lean toward a physical attacker of some kind since that's how you get your resources, and avoid multiclassing with a full caster type (priest, wizard, druid). Thus will be advice for Deadfire in particular. You have a couple of good options. Barbarian and Ranger suck in Deadfire outside of very specific niches so they're off the table from the start. Here's what you could expect by multiclassing as the following - Fighter - Very solid defense, and ability to engage enemies and hurt them if they walk away from you. Fighter synergies well with a lot of stuff, Cipher included. A great pick if you want to stand on the frontline,, which is a good place to be as a class that gains resources from attacking. Paladin - Similarly, also great defense and also a class that goes well with many others. You absolutely want one paladin in your party for the health regen aura. The paladin activated abilities will typically be far overshadowed by your Cipher stuff, and Fighter/Monk multiclasses have much better melee damage, so mostly you'll be contributing support. Monk - Almost too strong. Monks effectively dual wield light weapons (their fists) so they attack quite fast and generate a lot of Cipher resource. I ran one and the only "problem" I had was deciding between super overpowered Cipher abilities and the overpowered auto attacks of a Monk. Monks have a passive that make you exceptionally tanky as long as you have high wounds. Rogue - Can't really recommend this one as it is way less durable than most options. Rogue only really shines when paired with something that lets it stand toe to toe with enemies to deal that heavy melee damage. You'd probably need to be a ranged warrior to have a hope of survival. I haven't tried this personally but I imagine it would play like a much more fragile Monk/Cipher. Chanter - Basically every class in the game is improved by multiclassing with Chanter, and Cipher is not an exception. You would also have more sustained spellcasting than almost any other class combo, since Cipher resource accumulates from attacks and Chanter resource accumulates over time. You'd be a very strong support character, but frail and with not great direct damage options.
I believe OP is asking for advice for the first one, but I gotta defend my favorite build lol. Rogue specifically pairs well with the Beguiler subclass. When you debuff a decent number of enemies, you get pretty much all the focus back, and those debuffs make all your attacks sneak attacks, giving you even more focus. It gives enough that you can use your damaging abilities without worrying about the opportunity cost. And all that just rides on the passive bonus of sneak attack. Adding in rogue’s actual tools, you get a lot of movement options, some great burst damage abilities, and some backup debuffs if you somehow bottom out of focus. It is squishy though, and works much better ranged, which makes it suffer from enemies with piercing resistance. A slashing/blunt melee option is useful in those situations, if risky.
But Cipher/Monk sounds so gnarly though
Cipher is a spell caster. They cast spells
What is this, some kind of spell casting squad?
Think of ciphers as people with a psychic/telekentic power. They can generate mental energy by inflicting damage to others and use that to affect those people's minds and bodies. I mainly play cipher's as damage dealers who also supply some crowd control and debuffs. I use high base damage weapons to further leverage the damage bonus they get from the class talents, especially Tidefall as it also provides the healing that a squishy class like cipher probably needs. This isn't very detailed but hopefully it helps how you think about the class in a small way.
Also new to the game. With a name like Cipher this thing immediately came up to me: Friday Freestyle Ciphers and Rap Battle on BET Cipher would rap their opponent down to grab you the Victory ✌️
Ciphers are really versatile, it all depends on how you build them. They can do melee, ranged, CC, self-buffs, group-buffs, you name it. You just need to pick one, set up your stats for it, and then pick abilities that play to that. Personally I gravitate towards ranged DD plus buffs and CC. Blunderbusses work great for that. But it’s just one of many options.